


I’ve got you (under my skin)

by eledae



Category: ATEEZ (Band)
Genre: Carnival, Eventual Smut, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Hybrids, Injury, M/M, Mythical Beings & Creatures, Urban Fantasy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-09
Updated: 2021-02-09
Packaged: 2021-03-15 04:13:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,710
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29307831
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eledae/pseuds/eledae
Summary: Newly-graduated vet Jeong Yunho’s scored his dream job, working with mythical creatures at the Carnival Elemental. Being bitten by annoyingly hot sea serpent hybrid Song Mingi was not in the job description.
Relationships: Jeong Yunho/Song Mingi
Comments: 20
Kudos: 73





	I’ve got you (under my skin)

**Author's Note:**

> Hi all!!! Please enjoy something a little shorter and fluffier before we return to our usual programme of angst, pining and peril! This story is for my dear @cate0092, by way of thanks for her miraculously hot yungi artwork ❤️

Yunho’s had a whole lot of first times since he started working at the Carnival Elemental just a few short months ago. 

He thought he’d seen a lot growing up around mythical animals on his parents’ rescue farm; had a few eye-opening placements at veterinary college, too. He’s sure as shit not going to forget his experiences deworming sasquatch litters any time soon, but somehow none of it has prepared him for what it’s really like working amongst the carnival’s creatures.

Take the wyvern, for example. Ayvar is small as wyverns go, kind of like a sweet little two-legged dragon with big, leathery batwings, but clipping his claws is next-level difficult. Not because they’re tough to cut — they are, they’re fighting back against everything but his biggest industrial clippers — but because he’s a nosy little bastard with an opinion about everything, including Yunho’s non-existent lovelife. 

Yunho’s trying his best to dodge questions from the scaly love guru while throwing all his body weight behind the clippers when Yeosang ducks his head into the shed that’s become their temporary grooming salon. He’s so happy to see the fortune teller that he almost throws the clippers aside and hugs him, until he notices the worried look on Yeosang’s face. 

Like all of the carnival’s human performers, the fortune teller is a hybrid. His sphinx-kinship is most obvious in his calm, serene manner, so seeing him worried just worries Yunho.

“What’s up? Do you need me somewhere?” 

He’s hoping the answer’s yes — even helping the basilisk molt again or treating the fungus on the jackalope’s feet would be better than having the wyvern offering to help him make a killer profile for online dating one more time. 

“I was wondering if you’d take a look at Eunjae when you’re done?”

The wyvern’s scaled tail thrashes against the ground as Yunho manages to get halfway through another rock-like claw. “Ah, careful, doc! If that’s how clumsy your hands are, I’m not surprised you’re still single!”

Hopefully he doesn’t look as desperate as he’s feeling. “Eunjae’s not well? How’s she doing?” 

The pegasus mare is nine months through what’s been a difficult pregnancy from the get-go, according to stories. Yunho’s only been here for her last trimester; she’s one of the main reasons the carnival’s owner went looking for a full time vet, although there’s been plenty else to keep him busy too. Horny, nosy reptiles amongst them. 

“She’s getting really restless with all the rain, but I think there might be something else up, too.”

“What does the boss say?”

“Seonghwa’s in town today. He’s got a meeting with the council to try and convince them to let us use the cliffside caves for the lindworm.” He hesitates before continuing. “It might be best if you wait for him before you take a look, though. She might not react that well to you by yourself.”

“She’s been okay with me so far? I mean, she won’t talk to me yet, but she’s let me examine her.”

“Only because he’s there. He’s the only one she trusts.” Like Yeosang, Seonghwa’s a hybrid. He’s pegasus-kin and the only one Eunjae even speaks to, other than her mate.

“Isn’t there anyone else, one of the others that she’d trust enough to let me check her?” He’s running through them in his head. “How about Hongjoong?” The carnival’s medic is fully human like him, but he’s been with the carnival for years and seems to have the trust of most of the performers, hybrids and mythics alike.

Yeosang looks uncomfortable. “The pegasi are pretty snobbish about normies. Sorry, just, they only really tolerate you because Seonghwa’s there. Two normies are only going to piss her off.”

“What about Jongho?” He’s seen the siren hybrid soothe an entire audience with his voice. “Can’t he help her relax enough for me to take a look, if she gets that I’m just trying to help her and the foal?”

“If he uses enough of his voice to work on her, it’s going to work twice as well on you. It’s powerful stuff, you’re not going to be able to do what you need to do if he’s singing.” Yeosang hesitates. “There’s maybe one other option. We can ask Mingi.”

“Oh… okay?” Not what he was expecting. 

He barely knows the sea serpent hybrid to speak to, just that he’s a big, slightly off-putting presence, and he’d thought that snakes and horses weren’t exactly best buddies. 

Not that Mingi’s a snake as such, but he’s got that whole serpentine vibe going on; the wide shoulders, long torso with patches of greyish scales running down his stomach towards his narrow waist, picking up in spiral bands around the long muscles of his thighs. Not that he’s been looking as such, just that Mingi performs near-naked in a tank of water and some things are hard to unsee. Hybrid anatomy has always intrigued him, it’s just scientific curiosity. “How is he — I mean, he doesn’t seem that soothing?”

“You haven’t talked to him much, have you?” Yeosang takes pity on him. “It’s a serpent-kin thing. It’s more lowkey than the siren voice, and he doesn’t use it much, not unless you ask.”

“And you think she’d listen to him?”

“I think he could talk the moon down, if he wanted to.” Yeosang squints at him, sidelong. “Should help your nerves, too. It’s not going to knock you out, not like Jongho. Just take the edge off a bit.”

“As long as I still know what I’m doing.”

“Oh, you’ll be fully aware. That’s part of its charm.” Yunho’s not about to ask what the faint smirk on his face means. 

The jaws of the clippers close with a final sounding crunch on the last of the claw and he wrenches the fragment loose. Ayvar cranes his long neck around to wiggle his claws and inspect the damage. 

“If Mingi’s free, I can come take a look as soon as I’ve finished here. I’ve just got a couple more claws to do.”

“Naw, you should go,” says the wyvern. “See what’s up with Eunjae.” They’ve all got a soft spot for the idea of a pegasus foal. Not for Eunjae, as such, she’s around 2,000 pounds of muscle and feather who’d eat you alive soon as look at you, but a foal is something special.

Yunho grew up around unicorns and pegasi on the farm but he’s never seen any of them give birth safely, not this far from their own home lands. If he can help her give birth safely, it’s going to be a real gift to them all. 

He pats Ayvar’s metallic scales and the wyvern’s wings drop and fold closed with the sound of a wardrobe full of leather coats settling into place. “I’ll come back to finish off later, okay?”

“You do that, doc.” The wyvern’s slit pupil narrows in an eye the colour of emeralds and his tongue flicks out in a hissing laugh. “Got some more ideas about finding you a date.”

Yeosang’s mouth twitches at that. “I think Mingi’s down on the beach. We can go ask him now.”

“Ask him for a date, while you’re at it,” suggests the wyvern, hissing again at the look on Yunho’s face. “What? You could do a lot worse. Dragon-kin, once you try ‘em, you know what I’m saying?”

Yunho’s face is still hot despite the biting wind when they track down the sea serpent hybrid on the beach. Despite the breeze and the storm clouds overhead he’s laying out full-length on a deck chair at the tideline, bare legs dangling in the waves, reading the paper. His shorts and thin T-shirt give Yunho goosebumps; how can he not be freezing cold? Even with the padded coat he’s put on to examine the pegasus, it feels like the chill is finding its way straight through to his bones.

He hangs back while Yeosang explains their request, but Mingi seems to agree readily enough. The serpent-kin stuffs his newspaper away in a back pocket and drags the chair away up the beach to the high tide line as they leave. 

Set back a little way from the beach, the field the pegasi live in is muddy and heavily rutted from the tractor Seonghwa uses to haul their hay across to the barn. It’s been raining off and on for days, now. Part of Eunjae’s problem is that the rain keeps her barn-bound; while she’s pregnant the weight of the foal means it’s not safe to fly while there’s a chance of her wings getting waterlogged. She’s not getting the exercise she needs, and it’s driving her nuts.

Sure enough, the dappled pegasus mare is pacing back and forth when they reach the barn, and she looks even more irritable than usual. Her massive head tosses at the sight and scent of him and she swings an accusing glare at Yeosang. The hissing swish of her tail and the furious flicking of her slate grey wingtips are loud in the silence of the barn. 

Yeosang bows politely to her, ignoring the glare. “Eunjae, we just want to make sure you’re doing okay. You didn’t seem entirely happy, earlier.”

She’s prancing a little now, light on her hooves for an animal of her well-muscled bulk and clearly less than impressed with the sphinx-kin. 

Yunho puts his bag down and holds up his hands, trying to look harmless and knowledgeable at the same time. “I just need to check on you and the foal, okay, Eunjae? I know Seonghwa would want us to make sure you’re alright, if he was here.” Harmless and knowledgeable. Trustworthy as a box of puppies.

Beside him, Mingi snorts. “Look, Eunjae, I know you don’t want us here. The sooner you let the doc take a look, the sooner we get out of your hair. Mane. Sound alright?”

His serpent voice is… yeah, it’s good. Low and soothing, but there’s something sweetly rough around the edges too, makes Yunho want to lean in and listen. He shakes his head a little to clear it.

Mingi takes a step forward, leisurely, non-threatening. Her nostrils flare at his scent. 

“I’ll even read you your favourite sections of the newspaper.” He takes it out of his pocket and waves it in front of her. When she lets the serpent-kin pull a camp stool over to sit by her head, Yeosang gives Yunho’s shoulder a squeeze and retreats. 

Yunho picks up his bag and makes his way around her, moving slowly and giving her plenty of warning of what he’s doing. He’s just starting his examination when Mingi starts to read aloud.

“Leo. You look like a Leo, I’m just getting that feeling. _‘Are the mysterious vibes you’re getting all in your head, or is a near stranger about to approach you with an impossible offer of love? If you look before you leap, you may lose this lucky chance, so take your courage in both hands —”_ he looks over the edge of the paper — “hooves? both hoofs? _and launch into happiness._ ’”

His voice is gravelly and lulling and it takes Yunho a long moment to remember what he’s here for. Yeosang’s right, there’s something about it that just makes him relax, unknots the tightness of his neck and shoulders, tension he didn’t even know he was carrying.

“Is that… are you reading her horoscopes?”

“I don’t know when her birthday is, gotta do all of them. What’re you?”

“Um, Aries?”

Mingi peers around the flank of the pegasus, frowning. “No way you’re an Aries.”

“Ah, yeah, I am. My birthday’s in March.”

“Weird. Okay.” He shrugs and shakes out the paper. “Aries. ‘ _Don’t expect too much out of this week, and you won’t be disappointed. The fates have plenty in store for you, but this is one week you’ll prefer to look at in your rear-view mirror. But current pains will lead to a difficult decision that may require you to surrender something you hold dear._ ’”

“Can I change my mind?” Yunho murmurs. “I’d rather be Leo.”

It’s not like he’s even got a lot he can surrender. Seonghwa owns the trailer he lives in, and he’s still paying off a mountain of student debt from veterinary college, although his parents have helped out. His old bike is pretty much clapped out, with just enough parts holding together to get him to and from the city.

Still, it’s a horoscope, right? What do they know?

He pulls his focus back to the pegasus, but so far the examination’s not telling him anything he didn’t already know. She’s a little underweight, maybe hasn’t been eating like she should with no ability to exercise and the shitty weather affecting her mood. Some concentrated feed might help give her a little more energy. 

The restless movements of Eunjae’s back hooves have slowed, and it feels like she’s just shifting her weight to ease her discomfort now. The foal gives a healthy kick as he runs his hands along her abdomen, and it hits him for the first time that he’s really going to see it, a baby pegasus, and not too far away now. 

Mingi’s voice is a weirdly soothing sound in the background — he’s finished horoscopes and moved onto football results — as he finishes checking her belly. One thing he’s spotted as he checks the foal is that she seems to be moving her left wing a little stiffly, maybe a little less freely than the right.

“Eunjae, would you mind extending your left wing for me? I just want to take a look underneath.” He waits while she snaps out her wing like a giant, heavy fan and curves it forwards so he can see the downy feathers at the base of the wing. The pegasi are prone to fleas and mites and it’s easy for a bite to get infected, especially when she’s not flying regularly.

Sure enough, when he starts to explore the soft feathers where her wing meets coarser horse hair, he sees the telltale swelling of an infection. 

That’s when the rain starts up outside with a heavy sound on the barn roof, pelting off the metal. He feels Eunjae’s reaction through his gloves, a whole body shudder. It’s harder to hear Mingi’s voice now too, which maybe explains what happens next, when he tries to piece it together later, at the hospital. 

He’s just pressing as gently as he can around the inflamed bite to test the swelling when there’s a coiled sense of movement as she wheels around. He just has time to throw up a defensive arm when a sudden percussive _thump_ knocks him all the way back across the barn floor. He’s left staring up at the barn roof far above him while every sense he has starts to scream at him all at once.

“It’s okay,” he says, or tries to say around the absence of air in his lungs. 

He got his arm in between her hoof and all of his vital organs, so there’s that. His arm which he’s fairly sure is now broken, despite the padded jacket. Feels like burning splinters every time he breathes, which is probably not nearly as often as he should be breathing. Mingi’s right beside him in an instant, mouth open and horrified, like he’s trying to breathe for him.

“Yunho, fuck. Fuck. Are you alright?”

All he can manage in response is a wheeze. Mingi’s there with him while he’s still trying to figure out oxygen again, wrapped around him carefully and helping him ease away from the pacing pegasus. He puts gentle hands on Yunho’s arm and the splinters _sing_ with pain and he makes a noise that makes Mingi’s whole body cringe along with him. 

They get him sat down against the wall and Mingi goes to stand in front of the pegasus where she’s clearly upset and fretful, reaches out to gentle her with soft careful hands. Yunho hears the voice of calm again, too low to make it out — horoscopes? maybe a weather report? movie reviews? — and something about the edges of the serpent tones calm him too, even in the middle of an agony that feels like it’s burning him from the inside. 

When he opens his eyes again the pegasus is gone, retreated to her own stall at the back of the barn perhaps, and Mingi is crouched down in front of him. 

“She pulled her kick,” Yunho says. “She didn’t mean to hurt me, I just startled her.” His vision’s swimming in and out, dark spots threatening to swallow the world around him. 

“I’ve called Hongjoong. He’s on his way. An ambulance too. Going to be a while, though,” says Mingi. He’s got one hand on Yunho’s shoulder with just enough weight behind it to feel him there, but not grating on anything that hurts. “Where’d she get you? Your breathing okay?”

He nods and then lets out an embarrassing whine when it jars something painful. “My arm. Maybe ribs?”

“Okay, you want the bad news? We’re gonna need to get you up to the road. The field’s such a mess at the moment, the ambulance is gonna get stuck if they try it.” 

Yunho’s blinking at Mingi for long minutes before he realises that means walking. Somehow, he’s going to have to get back across that field.

“Let’s do it,” he says before he can chicken out. The sooner he gets there, the sooner he can swallow his own body weight in painkillers. He holds out his good arm as far as he can so that Mingi can help lever him to his feet. They only make it a precious few centimeters before it’s too much and he’s back down on the ground.

His breath is coming in soft gasps as he breathes through the pain. “How about, can you... maybe carry me?”

“I’m worried I’m gonna hurt you worse if I try.”

“Maybe if you talk to me? Do the voice? It helps. Read me more horoscopes, don’t care.”

There’s a silence and he looks up to meet Mingi’s dark, troubled gaze. “There’s actually something else I can do for the pain, if you’re okay with it. Should help get you on your feet, at least.”

“Cryptic,” he breathes. Must be a mythic thing, if he’s being this cagey. Right now he’d drink Mingi’s blood if it helped with the pain, though. “Is it blood? Do I have to drink your blood?” I’d totally drink your blood, if it helped.

“That’s vampires. Which don’t exist, I don’t think.” The corner of his mouth lifts in a faint smile. “I would have to bite you, though.”

“Isn’t that werewolves?” He’s so lightheaded right now, Mingi’s mouth looks so good. If it takes the pain away, even better.

Mingi grins — nice teeth, yep, bite me! — and too late he realises he might have said that part about his mouth out loud. 

“It’s another serpent trick. We’ve got a kind of venom, it’s toxic in higher doses. Inject lower amounts, well. There’s a sedative effect, amongst other things. There are some side effects you might want to know about.”

“If it helps with the pain, I don’t care if it flies me away to fairyland and makes me sing like a canary. Do it.” He wants to reach out with his good hand and snag Mingi, drag him closer till he gives up the magic fang juice, but he’s also tensed up to stop anything moving and hurting more than it already is. “Please, just… do it, okay?”

“Alright.” Mingi’s eyes flicker over his body, come to rest on his neck. “I’ve bitten people before, but not… not for this. Medically, I’m not a hundred percent on how this works, but I think your throat should work. Is that okay?”

“Stop asking me.” He can feel the shock starting to kick in, and once he starts shaking it’s going to jar everything and he passionately does not want that to happen. 

Mingi unzips the top of his padded coat, careful as he can, and bares as much of his throat as he can without moving him too much. “I just need you to okay this, my venom’s a controlled substance. It’s listed on our hazard register, I’m not kidding.”

His fingers tickle on the bare skin of Yunho’s neck. “I’m sorry, bureaucracy’s a _bitch_. Just please do it, now.”

Mingi’s calming serpent voice is at odds with his words. “It’s not the paperwork, idiot, I just need you to know there’s a risk. I’m not supposed to bite anyone without written consent.”

“Not happening, I’m right-handed, I can’t sign shit right now, just. Fucking bite me, I’m not kidding. Mingi, _please_.”

At last, at last, he gets to see the sea serpent’s fangs and part of him scampers merrily down a path of anatomical curiosity — they’re like canines at the edges of his jaw, but far finer and sharper, and of course they’re _retractable_ because he never normally sees them! — while another part is screaming for release from the pain and another tiny giddy voice is wondering _Are you sure you’re not a vampire?_

He tilts his neck with a little yip of pain and feels the heat of Mingi’s breath a moment before the sting of his teeth hits, a sudden laceration. A feeling of cold floods him. He shivers all over and… it doesn’t hurt. Or rather, it does, but it doesn’t matter so much. 

The cold’s being replaced by a feeling of warmth and tightness, like his skin’s full of a warm liquid that makes him stretch like a balloon. A happy balloon. A floating, happy balloon full of something like bourbon. Or vodka. Or maybe a good Irish coffee? It’s under his skin, swelling inside him, and he feels so pleasantly full and light at the same time.

Mingi’s watching him from so close that he could touch his fang with one finger, and he’s kind of curious, but even as he reaches out the fangs slide back out of sight and he pokes one corner of the serpent’s mouth, instead. The sensation is weirdly intense. He’s conscious of the soft velvety warmth of Mingi’s lip, the faint wetness where his fingertip dug a little deeper into his mouth.

“Oh.” He focuses on the golden brown of Mingi’s eyes instead, the metallic, swirling shine of his irises, like the wyvern’s pretty eyes but a warm, dark amber. “Oh, hang on, but what do I taste like?”

“Let’s get you on your feet.” Mingi puts one hand under his good elbow and slides an arm around his waist. Yunho finds himself lurching upright, registering the pain from far away. 

“Do I taste like chicken?”

“I’m going to help you walk there, but you let me know if you want to take a break, okay?”

He’s moving through the barn, and the weird thing is, it’s almost like he’s floating. When they get out to the field the rain’s already stopped, but the sky’s still a threatening shade of purplish bruise-grey.

“I wanna touch your mouth again. It was so soft, Mingi, and the rest of you looks so hard, how does that work? Can I put my fingers in your mouth? 

“You know how I mentioned side effects? Temporarily increased libido is one of the most common.”

Horniness, well that explains a lot. “This is the venom? That makes sense, actually, because I didn’t really think of you as hot before, and now suddenly —“ he goes to throw his arms wide and gives a loud squawk of pain.

“Low impulse control,” says Mingi with exaggerated patience. “You’ll do and say things you wouldn’t normally. Don’t worry, I’m not going to repeat any of this.”

“Well, you could repeat the part where you bit me, I wouldn’t mind. That was hot, too. How did I not notice you’re so hot?”

“Maybe I’m an acquired taste.”

“Am I am acquired taste? Do you want to bite me again? And if I taste like chicken, is it good chicken, the kind you’d get again? Or are you already like, I wish I didn’t eat here?”

“Watch the puddles.” Mingi steers him around the heavy tyre ruts by the gate and leans him on the fence to unlatch it. In the distance, the sea is dark and sullen under the stormy sky.

Mingi comes back to take Yunho through the gate.

“You okay to make it to the red shed?”

Their main office and the carnival entrance with its garish towering iron phoenix is off by the main carpark on the beach. Yeosang comes out of the office as they’re crossing the fairway.

“Is he okay, what happened? Holy crap, was it Eunjae?”

“She got antsy and kicked him. He’s got a couple of broken bones, most likely.”

Yunho can see the lion of the sphinx hybrid in Yeosang now, with all the startling clarity of the venom heating his veins. He’s so tawny-blonde and pretty, with eyes like dark gold coins. “Regal,” he breathes fondly. “Just like a lion. King of the Carnival.”

The lion turns on the sea serpent with a raised eyebrow. “Mingi?”

“Yeah, I gave him a little something for the pain.”

“Seonghwa’s going to have your ass.”

Yunho struggles against the hands holding him and gives a little mewl as the pain seeps through his happy bubble. “No! Seonghwa can’t have your ass. You were only trying to help, you did help.” He’s still trying to figure it out as they get him up the steps into the office. The battered leather couch looks like a welcome heaven as he staggers towards it. “Maybe we could give Seonghwa my ass instead? Ayvar’d like that. Or no, he wanted me to date a dragon.”

“Listen, before you go saying something you really regret, let’s get you sitting down.” He didn’t realise just how much his legs were shaking until Mingi and Yeosang lower him onto the couch. “Right, I’m gonna go wait for the ambulance. Yeosang, are you good to stay with him?”

“Coward,” says the lion. 

“He’s about five seconds away from offering me his ass, and I’d like it if he could still look me in the eye tomorrow.”

He leaves the office without looking back, and Yunho already misses him. Something about his voice. It felt like everything was going to be okay, as long as he could hear his voice.

“How’re you doing, Yunho?” The sphinx hybrid is watching him with those gold coin eyes. “Bet this is a day you’ll be happy to see the back of.”

He hears that husky voice again in his ear: _Aries. This is one week you’ll prefer to look at in your rear-view mirror._

“You’re a fortune teller, right?” The sphinx nods. “Do you believe in horoscopes?”

“In a way, sure.” Yeosang’s eyes catch and hold him. “I think that the universe has many ways of dangling the possible threads of the future in front of us. Whether we take hold of them can be up to us.”

Maybe it’s the pain and shock lurking just around the edges of his calm — especially now that he doesn’t have the magical snake voice there to keep him cosy — but it’s the horoscope’s talk of surrender that gets him the most. A difficult decision, the loss of something he holds dear?

“So if it’s something bad, or — or something I don’t want, I can avoid it, right?”

Yeosang smiles just like his sphinx counterpart and for a moment he sees the hybrid’s kinship clearly; the riddle-maker, the keeper of secrets. The tease. “I said it _can_ be up to us. Sometimes, whatever it is? It’s on its way, coming ready or not.”

Jongho’s waiting for him when he comes out of A&E with his new cast on and his arm in a sling. Seeing the siren-kin hunched up over his phone in the waiting room unknots half the muscles he didn’t realize were still tensed up. After the ride in the ambulance here, it’s like a tiny part of him was worrying that they’d leave him to find his own way home. He’s not going to be able to ride his bike for weeks now, and it’s a weird feeling to be so useless to himself, to anyone.

“Yunho, hey.” Jongho pockets his phone and gives Yunho a welcome surprise by folding him into a warm and gentle hug. The mottled fawn and brown feathers along his cheekbones are soft and downy against Yunho’s skin. The siren hybrid’s not usually one for the touchy-feely stuff so it’s unexpected but nice, aside from the twinge of pain that makes it through the blanket of venom and drugs. “What’s the damage?”

“Well, the arm’s broken, but the ribs are just bruised. So I kinda got lucky.”

Even as he says it though, he doesn’t quite believe it. He’s basically worse than useless to the carnival, just three months into the job. He lets Jongho lead him to the parking garage and his tiny battered Honda Saturn. Folding himself into the passenger seat is an ordeal and a half, but he manages it with minimal pathetic noises.

Jongho cranks up the car stereo with ballads and seems inclined to sing along rather than talk, and Yunho’s grateful. He leans his head on the window and watches the overgrown ruins of downtown Mayfield pass by in the dusky blue evening light, all angled, crumbling skyscrapers and rusting traffic signs. It’s dark enough that the Breaks are barely visible, just a handful of long fluttering distortions against the backdrop of the city. The Mayfield behemoth bellows somewhere in the distance, answered after a moment by the leviathan in the harbour.

This late in the evening the city ring road’s moving okay and even the lanes of cars on the bridge are creeping along steadily. Once they hit the turnoff out to the western bays the traffic starts to clear. It’s Monday, so the carnival isn’t open tonight and the road’s almost empty as Jongho signals the last turn out to Caster Bay. 

In a lull between power notes he finally asks the question that’s been nagging at him. “How’s Eunjae doing, do you know?” He’s been thinking about her a lot, worried that she’s feeling bad about what happened when it wasn’t her fault.

“You can ask Seonghwa when you get back. He’s back from town, would have picked you up except he took the bike.”

He really isn’t up to seeing Seonghwa right now. “Is he — is he mad at me?”

Jongho gives him a curious glance. “What, why?”

“I scared the crap out of Eunjae, for a start. And I’m going to be zero use to him as a vet until this heals.” He lifts the cast and his arm throbs dully under the meds. “I just feel like… I’ve let him down. He hired me based on Hongjoong’s recommendation, and I kinda feel like I’ve screwed everything up.”

Jongho’s frowning as he navigates the tight curves of the coast road, and it’s scaring him. The way the siren’s driving with only a fraction of attention to the winding road and the frown, both. 

“Yunho, you need to talk to him, okay? All I’m going to say is, if that’s how you feel, you’re probably the only one feeling like that. Just talk to him.”

When they pull into the staff carpark, he feels another pang of uselessness seeing his battered old bike sitting abandoned under the lean-to at the end of the lot. Six weeks minimum they said, until he can ride it again. 

Hauling himself out of the Saturn is another family fun-sized assortment of pain but he takes Jongho’s arm and the siren’s strong enough to lever him out of the low seat, just like shucking an oyster. 

“Everyone’s over at the firepit, now that the rain’s holding off. You game?”

“Sure.” He’d planned to go straight back to the trailer and bury his sorrows in a binge marathon of back issues of Hybridology Digest, but what the hell. The sooner he talks to Seonghwa, the sooner he knows what’s happening with the job.

Stupid or not, it’s the horoscope that’s on his mind. If he’s going to have to surrender something he holds dear, it doesn’t get much dearer than working at the carnival. He’s still feeling the same dazed sense of wonder he felt when Hongjoong talked him into applying for the job; still excited every single time he walks through the Staff Only door in the red shed and smells that hit of liniment and feather balm.

Most of the carnival’s crew are gathered at one of the big outdoor fire pits when they arrive. The scent of beef frying on the grill makes him realize how long it’s been since he’s eaten. Pizza boxes and drinks coolers are scattered around the loose circles of chairs set up around the pit. Jongho pats his back and peels off towards the pizza where Yeosang’s holding court with the griffin-hybrid Geonhak, Ayvar the wyvern and a couple of the jackalopes, sprawled lazily by the fire.

Yunho looks around but Seonghwa’s nowhere to be seen; hard to miss the towering black wings, even in a crowd. He follows his stomach to the grills instead, where Hongjoong’s frying strips of steak and chicken skewers in an apron that reads _‘Caution: extremely hot’_.

When he sees Yunho he hands off the tongs to Mingi, who’s sitting on a deckchair nearby scrawling something on his newspaper. Seeing him now brings back all the worst of the horny shit he said earlier, as well as that annoying lurch of heat. 

_Can I put my fingers in your mouth?_

_Oh, your mouth is so soft but you look so hard, Mingi._

It’s like he can still feel the venom screwing with him, the stealthy pulse of _want_ running through him as soon as he sees the serpent-kin. At least now, hopefully, it’s diluted enough that he can keep his mouth shut and nobody needs to know the stupid contents of his head. 

Hongjoong gives him a careful, loving hug before putting his hand out for the x-rays Yunho’s got stashed under his arm; he’s a friend first, doctor close second. He heads over to the red shed to take a look under the security lights.

Mingi hands Yunho the newspaper as he turns his attention to flipping the chicken skewers. “Welcome back, walking wounded, good to see you on your feet again. Take a look at the crossword, number three down. I’m not sure, could need your help.”

“Not gonna be able to write much.” He taps the cast with the paper, hoping Mingi’s going to blame the fact that he’s standing so close to the grill for the way his face is heating up. 

“You tell me, I’ll write it in later.” His smile is pointed. “You want something to eat? Got some tasty chicken here. Definitely the kind you’d try more than once.”

Yunho groans despite himself. “What happened to _I’m not going to repeat this_?”

“Not to anyone else,” he says, grinning. “I’m reserving the right to give you shit about it whenever we’re alone though.”

“Number three down.” Crossword. The crossword’s safe, unlike the idea of being left alone with Mingi right now. This venom’s going to be the actual death of him. “You wanted help with number three down?” 

More than half of the answers are completed already in decisive slashes of heavy-handed ballpoint pen. “You do your crossword in pen?”

Mingi scrapes at the onions caramelizing on the grill. “Pencil’s for people who don’t know how to get creative. I mean, who’s actually going to know the technical name for the part of the toothbrush that joins the shank to the head?”

Yunho checks his answers. “I’m pretty sure it’s not ‘toof’.”

“Yeah, but like how sure? 100% sure, or is there the slightest margin for doubt? Because it fits.”

“Only if ‘cowfart’ is correct.”

“Come on, that’s the national dessert of New Zealand, right?”

Okay, number three down… “A basic unit of memory made up of 8 adjacent bits. Four letters.” They made him do a computing paper at college, and it’s there on the tip of his tongue. 

“Byte!” he says, happy he’s remembered it until he catches the teasing darkness in Mingi’s eyes, remembers what he was doing with that mouth earlier today. The puncture wounds on his neck give a twinge at the memory and the breath catches in his throat.

“You got lucky,” murmurs Hongjoong, coming back to sling an arm around his waist. For a weird moment he’s sure Hongjoong’s talking about Mingi and he wants to argue with him about his definition of luck. “The break’s not bad, should heal up okay.”

It’s a relief to turn away from the laughing eyes of the serpent-kin and focus on work again. “How long till I can get the cast off, do you think?”

“Depends if you actually rest it like you’re supposed to.” He’s got his stern doctor-face on, looking only a little incongruous with the dorky apron. “Five weeks, maybe six?”

“I really need to talk to Seonghwa. Do you know where he is? Jongho said he was back from town.” He can’t keep putting this off. The guilt and worry are sitting low in his stomach, making him twitchy. 

“He’s over with Eunjae,” says Hongjoong. 

“Is she okay? She didn’t mean to hurt me, I just surprised her. It was pure reflex, she didn’t even have all her strength behind it.” One proper kick and he’d have needed a lot more than serpent venom to get him back on his feet so yeah, maybe he did get lucky.

“She’s fine. I helped treat that insect bite once she told us about it, but she just wanted some time with him to go over what happened. He’ll be out soon and you can talk to him.”

“He must be pretty annoyed.”

“Hmm?” Hongjoong looks up from the X-rays. “Who, Seonghwa? Why would he be annoyed?”

“Because I didn’t even last three months before freaking someone out badly enough to get hurt? Because I can’t do my job till this is off?”

“Yunho…” 

“You really think that’s how this place works?” Mingi’s looking genuinely unhappy. “I know you haven’t been here long, but seriously? You think he’d throw you under a bus when you’re already hurt?”

“It’s a business, though. It makes sense that you’d let go of someone who can’t pull their weight.”

The serpent-kin waves his tongs at the crowd around the fire pit. “If you look at all this and see a business, you’re looking at it wrong. It’s not a business, it’s a family.”

 _Yeah, but it’s not my family_ , he wants to say. Not yet, anyway. Apart from Hongjoong, nobody here knows him well enough to take him on as a liability.

“Mingi, give me those, you’re burning the steak.” Hongjoong takes the tongs from his hand. “Yunho, you need to eat something, you want some food?”

“Sure,” he says, even though his stomach’s still churning at the thought of talking to the pegasus-kin. He takes the sandwich Hongjoong throws together for him, bread wrapped around slices of steak, with peppers and onions and a squirt of hot sauce. 

“I can take on some of your duties, if you talk me through them.” Hongjoong makes it sound so easy, so rational. “You’re here for your brains, for what you know, not just for what you can do with your hands. We can get a vet in from town for anything urgent. Go on, sit, eat. Stop fretting, watch the show. San and Wooyoung are trying out something new.”

Mingi drags another chair over for Yunho and pats it. He sits, reluctantly. Half of him just wants to go track Seonghwa down and get this over with. He juggles the sandwich awkwardly, knowing he’s going to end up wearing most of it. 

Over by the pit Wooyoung’s spinning fire fans as he dances, the wheeling flames joining the sparks that the phoenix-kin sheds as he moves, lithe and smiling. The feathers trailing from his dark ponytail gleam scarlet and gold as they catch the light. Beside him, the salamander-kin is freestyling with his fire staff, tossing and catching the twirling staff as the star-shaped patterns on his arms glow like molten silver.

Jongho’s joined the crew around the firepit and is playing guitar along with the song San and Wooyoung are practicing to. His voice is the perfect counterpoint to their dance, soaring like the flecks of fire rising from Wooyoung and the whirl of light that is San. 

“Hongjoong’s right.” Mingi’s waves a cold bottle of raspberry lemonade at Yunho and puts it down beside his chair. “If you want to stay, they’ll find a way to make it work. Like it or not, you’re stuck with us.”

“I just don’t want to let anyone down. Everyone here, they work so hard.” Like Wooyoung and San dancing on their one night off, just to perfect a new routine. Dancing because they love it, but also because they’re proud of what they do and they’re always trying their hardest to be the best. 

“Oh, don’t worry. Nobody’s about to go easy on you just because your arm’s out of action. They’ll work you hard.” He tips back his bottle of beer and Yunho’s mesmerized for a moment by the movement of his throat. He tears his eyes away and back to the dancers.

“You want me to sign it?” 

He turns back to Mingi, who’s studying him with a smile. “Huh?”

“Your cast, want me to sign it? It’s looking a little bare.”

 _What is this, fifth grade?_ “Sure.”

He holds out his arm and Mingi hunches over the cast with his ballpoint pen, blocking Yunho’s view with his other arm. When he sees Yunho trying to peek he raises his eyebrows and waits him out. 

Yunho hurriedly looks elsewhere but finds he’s staring at the bands of scales running around Mingi’s thighs, flexing as he shifts to get a better angle on the cast. If he’s honest, it’s not scientific curiosity, not anymore. He wants to touch them and see if they’re as smooth as they look. See if they’re cool, or as warm as Mingi’s arm where he’s gently pinning the cast down to write. They look glossy grey in the firelight, but underwater they glow with a pale phosphorescence that shifts through mottled blue and green. It’s beautiful. They’re beautiful. 

Behind the grill Hongjoong clears his throat and shoots him a grin when he looks up, panicked. 

Is it fetishization? Shit, is he _fetishizing_ the serpent-kin? But he’s never gotten lost wanting to stroke Seonghwa’s wings, or… or rub his face along the pin feathers on Jongho’s cheeks. It’s just Mingi, Mingi and the fire of the venom still in his veins. Mingi, who seems to have finished signing the cast and is looking at him with the familiar patience that he remembers all too well from his venom-high that afternoon.

When you were asking him if you tasted like chicken and putting your fingers in his mouth, his brain provides helpfully.

“You’re done?” he asks brightly.

Mingi takes his hands away from the cast in a fancy reveal, big smile on his face. “Ta da!”

“Oh, it’s…” Actually, what is it? He tilts his head. “Hang on, I’ll get it, it’s just upside down for me.”

“But I already drew it right way up for you.”

“Huh.” SONG MINGI, that he can read in block letters that wobble across the plaster. The shape underneath, it’s surrounded by swirling black clouds. Frankly, it looks ominous. In the middle is some kind of misshapen creature with a snout and big dark eyes. “Is that Ayvar?” 

“It’s a baby pegasus!” _Clearly_ , his voice says. “Look, four legs, big smile?”

“Oh, they’re _wings_. Not clouds.”

Seonghwa’s voice comes from over his shoulder. “Hey, cute foal.” 

“There, see? He recognizes it.”

Yunho swings around, pulling himself up awkwardly to get to his feet for the carnival’s owner. He brushes helplessly at the crumbs and onions down his shirt. “I’m so sorry about today, is Eunjae doing okay?”

“She’ll be better once she sees you’re up and about again.” Under the elegant arch of his wings, Seonghwa’s watching him with the same intense gaze that unnerved him at the job interview until he realised how much kindness lay beneath it. “I’m so sorry you got hurt.”

“No, I was stupid, I didn’t give her enough warning. It’s not her fault.”

“If you’re feeling up to it, maybe we could visit her later on. I think it’d do her good to see you in one piece.” 

Hongjoong hands the pegasus-kin a charred ear of sweetcorn wrapped in napkins, licking butter off his fingers. “Yunho thinks you’re mad at him because he’s not going to be able to work for a while.”

He’s going to kill him, old friend or not. 

But Seonghwa looks sympathetic. “Yunho, you haven’t been here long, but you probably get that we’re not big on opening up to outsiders, right?” Yunho recognizes the soft tones he’s using; uses them himself when he has to soothe one of the smallest of the jackalopes coming in for a check-up. “Did Hongjoong tell you, his first year here was a living hell? Nobody wanted to talk to him, nobody wanted to tell him the sorts of things he needed to know to do his job well. He only lasted this long because he’s got a stubborn, bloody-minded streak about a mile wide.” His sideways smile at Hongjoong is sweet. “And because he beat a fair few of us at arm wrestling, and he’s not scared of cheating to win. But by the time you showed up, him vouching for you meant something.”

Hongjoong hands over the tongs and spatula to Jongho, who’s joined him at the grill. Wiping his hands on the apron, he comes around to tuck himself under Seonghwa’s wing, one arm sliding around his waist.

“Eunjae told me I needed to apologise for her, but she also said I had to make sure you stayed, whatever it took.” Seonghwa winces apologetically at the next part. “She says she doesn’t like you, but she does trust you, as much as she can. She doesn’t want anyone else around to help her deliver. And even if I didn’t already see how much the creatures here like you, that alone would have earned you your place with us.”

“Boss!” It’s Yeosang at the door to the red shed. “Call for you, you free to come and take it?”

Seonghwa pats Yunho’s shoulder — be at peace, fluffy little jackalope — and heads back to the office.

“There, you see?” Hongjoong takes a bite of his own sandwich and his next words are muffled. “Relax. It’ll be okay.”

But seeing the fortune teller’s reminded him again. He scoops the paper up from the deck chair and waves it at Mingi.

“My horoscope, though. It came true, right? Pain, a week I’d want to see the back of? I’m still going to have to surrender something.” Miracle of miracles, though, it doesn’t seem to be the job, despite his best efforts. What does that leave, though? 

Mingi’s looking at him with that same air of amused patience from earlier. “Yunho, it’s just a horoscope, and a horoscope in a crappy daily paper, at that. They’re bullshit.”

“Why, what did yours say?” He unfolds it to the back section. “What are you?”

“It doesn’t matter, they’re bullshit.”

“He’s a Leo,” says Hongjoong, looking over his shoulder. “The one with the love heart doodles around it.”

“Mysterious vibes? You’re the one getting the mysterious stranger vibes?” He grins despite himself at the look on Mingi’s face. “You know what, though, that makes sense that it wouldn’t be Eunjae, even if she is a Leo. She’s far too in love with Rahul to be vibing with strangers. You, on the other hand…”

The silence stretches out just a beat too long. As Yunho’s smile falls away uncertainly, Mingi gains his back.

“Me, on the other hand?”

He suddenly realises that he’s got no idea if Mingi’s single. Yeosang’s smirk; could be something there, for all he knows. Half the carnival performers seem to have at least a casual hook-up going on with the other half, judging by the unspoken looks he sometimes picks up on. But they’re also a lot more casual about touch than his friends back at college, so it’s really hard to read. 

“Eunjae’s not a Leo, she’s a Cancer,” says Seonghwa, coming back to drape his arms and wings over Hongjoong. At least that’s one relationship he’s pretty clear on, because he never stops hearing about it. “Mingi, can you come help me get the lindworm settled for the night? I need you to tell her we’re working on the caves, but it might be another week or two to get sign-off.”

Mingi scoops the newspaper up from Yunho and tucks it away into his back pocket. “If you want to know if I’m seeing anyone, all you have to do is ask.”

He saunters off after Seonghwa, leaving Yunho blushing under Hongjoong’s curious gaze.

“How long does this venom stay in my system?” Even he can hear the pitiful whine in his tone.

“It’s really getting to you, huh?” His friend sounds anything but sympathetic. 

“Heightened horniness, how is that helpful? It’s like I see him, and I just… and he’s not even my type!” 

He’s never dated a lot — been too busy on the farm and then with his studies — but he’s been out with enough people to know that he’s definitely got a type. They’re usually a lot more like Wooyoung, to be honest. Small and adorable, with emotions right there in the open where they’re easy to read. Someone with enough energy to pull him around in their orbit, because he’s usually distracted by classes or work. 

Mingi’s not small and he’s not adorable; his cute little pegasus foal drawing looks like a winged messenger of doom. He’s got energy to burn, sure, but it’s all coiled up, and the thought of what that might look like unleashed makes him shiver. “I mean, look at him.”

“You’ve been doing that all night, far as I can tell.” Hongjoong bursts out laughing. “Yunho, the sea serpent venom? It literally lasts a couple of hours, max. I have no idea what’s getting under your skin about Mingi, but it’s nothing he's put there. Not intentionally, anyway.”

Yunho presses the cold bottle of lemonade to his cheeks and closes his eyes. “You’re kidding me.” 

“Hey, you could do worse. I hear good things.”

Oh god, and now he wants to ask, _things like what? from who?_ but he can’t, not while Hongjoong’s looking at him with those bright, mischievous eyes. 

“No? Don’t want to know? Okay, we’ll leave it.” He shrugs, his smile tinged with pure mischief, and turns back to watch the fire dance practice. 

So it’s not the venom, okay, _fine_. It’s probably just some weird sort of gratitude, after the day he’s had. Maybe there’s a rescuer version of Stockholm syndrome, where you get all horny for someone just because they’ve saved you from danger. Superheroes must get that a lot.

Mingi’s just a tall, lanky shape in the distance now, chatting to Seonghwa as he heads down to the beach to talk to the lindworm, torchlight wavering over the sand in front of him. It’s like seeing the hidden shape in a magic eye puzzle; he can’t unsee what the venom’s opened his eyes to. Objectively he’s got to admit that Mingi’s kind of hot, despite never having thought of him like that before. Kind of hot but also kind of impossible, for so many reasons. Even if the reasons aren’t immediately apparent right now.

Not small. Not remotely adorable.

Yeah, it’s probably just a rescuer thing. He’ll be back to normal tomorrow. Surely.


End file.
